Yes, Leonard Nimoy is retiring

CB Droege, 18th August 2011

At 80 years old, the wildly popular veteran of science-fiction film and television has decided to call it a career.

Leonard Nimoy recently announced on his twitter feed that he’s stepping down from acting and appearances permanently.

The recent octogenarian will no longer appear in any television shows or movies, and after three final public appearances at the upcoming Star Trek conventions in Las Vegas and Chicago and Atlanta’s DragonCon. His directing career will also come to a permanent end.

It’s not the first time Nimoy has discussed retirement, but he’s going through with it this time, and I think the likelyhood that any role will tempt him back out again is low.

The two productions most affected will be Fringe, where Nimoy plays the part of the late William Bell, a character which may have already been written out already, but death hasn’t stopped him from appearing so far - it is sci-fi, after all.

Perhaps more importantly, it means that we have no chance of seeing him as part of Star Trek 2, which has only just gotten its development underway. In the 2009 Star Trek film, Nimoy reprised his role as Spock, and served as a guide to the new version of the crew of the Enterprise, including his own past self, played by Zachary Quinto. He was originally slated to appear in the film, though in what capacity exactly, had not been revealed.

Nimoy has been a proponent of convention appearances for a long time, which makes his decision to stop doing even that a surprising one to some fans. His final appearance will be at the Star Trek convention in Chicago this October.